


Freshmen Taste Best

by Spurlunk



Category: Snowpiercer (2013)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - High School, Boarding School, Gen, Ghosts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-21
Updated: 2014-08-21
Packaged: 2018-02-14 04:45:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2178432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spurlunk/pseuds/Spurlunk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Curtis is a history teacher at Wilford Academy, and he's just minding his own business until Yona insists that her ghost friend Grey was murdered by the evil vice-principal Mason.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Freshmen Taste Best

Curtis used to enjoy his job. He had started as a history teacher right out of college at a public high school in the suburbs, and found his work fulfilling on multiple levels. It had been a tough decision to leave that position and come to work at Wilford Academy fifteen years ago, but the pay had been so much higher and the school provided room and board as well, proving to be a package that was almost impossible to turn down. 

 

Things had, however, not been exactly as they had seemed. It was better now of course, than it had been when he arrived. There were only a couple hundred students in the school, serving grades nine through twelve, with about half of them day students and the other half living in the two large boarding houses on campus. One of them was for boys, and one was for girls. Curtis lived in the boys' house, serving as the supervising adult and parent for about fifty teenagers. Tanya was in charge of the girls' house, where she lived with her five year old son Timothy, Curtis lived alone in the small apartment in the boys' house. The rest of the teachers lived in town, with those who had high school age students attending at a discounted rate and mostly boarding at the Academy as well, but the Vice Principal, Mason, lived on campus in a large house on the hill. Mason was the source of most of Curtis's problems.

 

A tall, ungainly woman, she was the daughter of the founder of the school, and ruled in his stead. She required complete discipline at all times, with rules that Curtis frankly found to be stifling and borderline abusive. He knew that if he thought so, the students he was in charge of surely felt the pressure even more, but they had less power than he did and dared not complain. Despite many of the older students being physically bigger than Vice Principal Mason, she was intimidating and they were mostly frightened of her. She had more power than someone of her stature should - one girl about five years ago had complained about freedom of religion when Mason had not allowed her to go off campus on Sundays to church, and the girl had been expelled, with her parents business mysteriously failing a few months later, leaving them in a much worse off position than they had been before. No one could prove Mason had anything to do with it, but her father Wilford was very powerful.

 

There was a shuffling of paper and Curtis looked up, jerked out of his own mind as he remembered that he was sitting at his desk in front of about a dozen senior students taking a history quiz. Yona, one of the few girls wearing a black sweater over her uniform shirt and skirt, was finished, she had set her test upside down and was leaning back in her seat, pushing her legs up against the back of the seat in front of her. She wore black tights, and Curtis was certain that if makeup was allowed at Wilford Academy she'd wear black eyeliner as well. Yona was very bright, the only sophomore in this upper level history class, but because of it she often got bored and had very few friends, if any at all. Curtis had spoken to Tanya about her, and she made sure to spend a little extra time checking in with Yona if she could. It helped that the girl was very close to her father, Namgoong, who taught at the school, though he lived off campus. Yona spent almost every weekend with him.

 

The senior boy sitting in front of her was Edgar, and probably Curtis's favorite student in the school. He was not very handsome and unremarkable in his studies, but he was passionate, a little revolutionary. He was obsessed with fairness, and had a highly developed sense of right and wrong. Curtis had named him prefect earlier this year, which he knew made the other boys suspicious of favoritism, but he truly believed Edgar was the one for the job. Edgar and Curtis spent a lot of time talking together in his classroom after school, and though Curtis agreed with him most of the time, he tried to temper his impulsiveness with words of caution.

 

Edgar, clearly annoyed, turned around and knocked Yona's feet off the back of the chair. She yelped in annoyance, and the other students looked up from their work. Curtis walked over to her and took her test away, then bent over so he could talk with her in a low voice.

 

"Yona, if you're finished, you may go back to your dorm early. Let Tanya know I said it was alright. Do you want me to write you a pass?" he asked, since it was the last period of the day anyway. She shook her head and grabbed her bag, standing up with a small smile.

 

"See you tomorrow, Mr. Curtis!" she said, and practically skipped out of the room.

 

Curtis knew that Tanya would already be at the girls' dorm at this time of day. She taught English, and only morning classes because she had to pick up her son from school and be with him in the afternoons. More often than not, Curtis, Namgoong, or any of the other school teachers sent Yona there early since she was prone to disrupting the class if she finished her work early and got bored. Mason either did not know, or chose to ignore this. 

 

When class was over and Curtis had collected all of the tests, Edgar wanted to stay and chat but Curtis told him to go to his soccer practice and they'd speak tonight. Gathering his things, Curtis decided to stop by the girls' dorm to say hello. Most of the girls were at sports practices, so the building was fairly empty. Yona was sitting on the floor of the common room with Tanya's adorable son Timothy when Curtis walked in, conferring together in low voices. Tanya was sitting on the couch, grading papers. She looked up and smiled when he walked in. Timothy stopped what he was doing and ran over to hug Curtis, who lifted him up in his arms to hug him back.

 

"Hey, little man. How was school?" he asked.

 

"It was fun! We learned about birds and Alex peed his pants."

 

"Come on now, Timothy," his mother chided him. Curtis and Timothy exchanged high fives before he put him down and let him go back to Yona, who smiled a hello at her teacher. She normally played field hockey, but after another girl had tripped her and Yona sprained her ankle, she'd gotten excused for the rest of the season. Curtis took a seat next to Tanya, and after a few cursory bits of small talk, he asked what he'd been wondering since he walked in.

 

"What do those two talk about? They don't have any toys, and she's at least ten years older than him."

 

"She tells him stories. At first he was afraid, she was telling him ghost stories, but then she told him the ghost was his friend. They call him Grey."

 

"Do you think they really believe he exists?"

 

"Timothy does, but he's so young I don't think it will do him any harm."

 

"Yona's fifteen, she's way past the age for imaginary friends."

 

"That's something you'll have to talk to her about. She takes comfort in stories about a ghost, I won't take that away from her."

 

"Do you think we should recommend the counselor speak with her?" Curtis asked.

 

"Andrew? Nah, don't worry about it. She's fine. The other girls think she's on drugs, but we've searched her room a few times and never found any. She's just a little eccentric."

 

"You're probably right. Well, I should go, I promised Namgoong I'd meet him for a quick coffee before study session," Curtis said, rising to his feet. Tanya raised her eyebrows suggestively.

 

"You two have fun with your "coffee"," she said, and Curtis smiled shyly.

 

"Tell my dad I said hi," Yona said, despite the fact that Curtis was certain she'd been too far away to hear their conversation. She was certainly a strange one.

 

"I will," Curtis said, and left.

 

About an hour later, Curtis was just buttoning his shirt back up, sitting on the edge of his bed in his apartment in the boys' dorm when he heard the thundering feet and boisterous shouts that informed him that his charges had arrived, sweaty and exhilarated from their sports practices. 

 

"You'd better leave out the back," Curtis said, and Namgoong nodded, but seemed to be in no rush. He was still shirtless, leaning back in bed and smoking a cigarette, despite the fact that they were not allowed in the dorms or academic buildings. There was a knock on the door, and Curtis tucked his shirt in, flattening his hair and opening the door a crack. It was Edgar, of course.

 

"Curtis! Mason's on her way over for a surprise inspection, she'll be here any minute!" he said. 

 

"Shit," Curtis muttered under his breath, and Edgar nodded.

 

"I know! Hurry!"

 

Curtis shut the door again and turned around - Namgoong was gone, he'd split out the window the moment he heard Mason's name. She did not approve of relationships among the staff, a fact previous teachers had learned the hard way. Curtis opened the door and came out into the common room, where a couple of the boys were already tidying up. 

 

"Edgar, check the second floor, I'll check the third," Curtis said, and began a quick inspection of the boys' rooms. Thankfully, they too were hustling to get their things tidied up and hide anything remotely contraband - Curtis did not allow his charges to have drugs or alcohol, but he did allow certain R rated movies and music that the vice principal would not approve of. These were hastily shoved under pillows and beneath loose floorboards.

 

When Mason walked into the common room, Curtis and Edgar were breathing a little too hard, but were otherwise in perfect shape. Without a word, she walked through the boys' rooms, and instructed them all to assemble in the common room. She started a long-winded speech about how they needed to step it up, they were disheveled and untidy and a horrible reflection onto the school and her father's name (her accusations were simply not true, Curtis knew, but he dared not speak), and she ended by simply saying, "Know your place. Keep your place. Be a shoe.". When she left, Edgar turned to Curtis, confused.

 

"Be a shoe? What shoe?" he asked.

 

"I have no idea," Curtis said with a sigh, and the boys began assembling in the study room for their required hour of supervised homework before dinner.

 

It was the next day that things began to go bad. Curtis was at breakfast, sitting alone at a round table, as most of the other staff ate in their own homes before arriving to work, and it would not be right for him to sit with his students. Yona came over and sat down, plunking her tray on the table. She poured her glass of orange juice into her bowl of cereal and began to eat as if that was completely normal behavior.

 

"Good morning Yona," Curtis said.

 

"Nobody believes me about Grey. They think I'm crazy. But I'm not," she said.

 

"Grey your ghost friend?"

 

"Yes. He used to be a student here. He knew something about Wilford Academy and Vice Principal Mason, and when he threatened to tell, they had him killed. He's a ghost now because he wants me to get justice for him before he can move on."

 

"Are you sure you don't want to speak to Andrew about this?"

 

"The guidance counselor? I'm telling you, Mr. Curtis. I think you can help me. People listen to you. Nobody listens to me."

 

"What did Grey know?"

 

"He won't tell me."

 

"If Grey was killed here, where is his body?"

 

"I don't know."

 

"Yona, I can't help you. I have no way to know you're not making all of this up."

 

"I don't lie!" Yona exclaimed, loud enough for the whole dining hall to hear her.

 

"I'm not calling you a liar, please calm down - "

 

"Stop telling me to calm down!" she yelled, her breakfast sloshing out over the table as she rose to her feet angrily. Edgar was over there in moments, and he grabbed Yona from behind in a restraining hug.

 

"Get off me!"

 

"Hey, it's okay, let's go somewhere else to talk about it, yeah?" he said.

 

"I - I need to go. I'm sorry," Curtis said, and fled the room.

 

Curtis was leaning against the brick wall of the dining hall, breathing slowly and methodically so as not to lose control of himself. Namgoong joined him, and pulled out a cigarette. Curtis reached out a hand for one, earning a raised eyebrow, but also one cigarette. Namgoong lit it for him and they stood there smoking together in silence for a few moments.

 

"I know what Yona's friend Grey found out about Wilford Academy." Curtis said.

 

"Mm?" Namgoong replied.

 

"It was almost fifteen years ago. Grey must have been a student sometime after that, I don't remember him, so he might have been a freshman or a sophomore. It was before your time, before his time. I don't think anyone here was here then, except Mason."

 

Namgoong didn't say anything, but he was listening. Curtis paused to exhale a small cloud of smoke.

 

"It was a sports trip - tennis. I was the chaperone of the boys table tennis team, and Mason came along with me for the girls. The tournament was great, everything went well, it was the train ride back that - well. We were in West Virginia, I think, and the train derailed. It crashed, and the impact and ensuing explosion destroyed nearly every car, everyone died except somehow our car, being the last one, detached and flew off a small distance away. We landed in the woods, and it was the middle of winter. We were nowhere near any kind of town or city, and there were no cell phones back then, not like there are now."

 

Namgoong was riveted now, paying close attention.

 

"You have to understand, we were starving. One of the boys ate some berries he found in the woods, but he passed out and never woke up shortly afterwards. We didn't eat anything else because we were afraid it was poisonous, after that. We had plenty of water from the snow, but we didn't leave the train car very often because it was shelter against the cold. It was freezing. So cold."

 

Curtis took a deep breath.

 

"It was Mason's idea. She said the boy who ate the berries was just lying there, fresh meat. She cooked him, and ate him. I did too. I don't even remember his name. She told me it was survival of the fittest. We attacked some of the younger kids, the ones who were weak, and killed them and ate them. I learned - I learned that freshmen taste best."

 

Namgoong stared at Curtis like he had just dropped in from another planet. Curtis thought he might throw up. The bell rang, which meant breakfast was over and they had five minutes to get to class. Curtis grabbed his bag and walked off.

 

The morning went by in a blur, and though Edgar tried to get Curtis to talk to him at lunch, he avoided him completely. It wasn't until after school that Curtis went to the girls' dorm again, and found Timothy and Yona there waiting for him.

 

"Grey told Timothy where his body is, we're going to go find him," Yona said.

 

"You're not going without us," Namgoong said. Curtis turned around and there he was, a look of grim determination on his face. Curtis tried to meet his eyes but Namgoong wouldn't.

 

"What foolishness are you dragging my boy into?" Tanya asked.

 

"Don't worry, we'll be back in a few hours," Curtis said, and Tanya frowned at him.

 

"You better," she said, and Curtis picked Timothy up and asked him to point the way, Yona and Namgoong following close behind.

 

As it became clearer and clearer that they were approaching Mason's house, Curtis became more and more wary. Edgar had joined them halfway there, demanding to be included, and nobody told him no, though they did not slow down to explain everything to him either. Timothy led the group to a fruit garden in Mason's backyard, and Yona knelt down in the dirt, ripping the plants away and digging at the dirt with her bare hands until Edgar found a couple of shovels and she moved aside as Curtis and Namgoong took over.

 

They hit something hard about three feet deep. Curtis put his shovel aside and knelt down in the dirt. Yona climbed in after him, holding Timothy's hand, and Namgoong and Edgar watched from above, not enoguh room in the newly dug hole for all of them. Curtis pushed away bits of dirt to reveal a skull staring back at him, and Yona rubbed away the rest of the dirt to reveal an entire skeleton.

 

"It's Grey," Timothy said.

 

"So it's true. Mason really did kill him." Edgar said, but those were his last words, because all Namgoong had time to do was yell in surprise as Mason stabbed Edgar in the throat from behind, his body flopping down to the ground, his head hanging over the open grave and blood dripping down onto Yona's shoulders.

 

"Namgoong!" Curtis exclaimed, climbing out of the grave only to find him locked in battle with Mason, both of them trying to get at the other with the shovels. Curtis grabbed the knife from where it had gotten stuck in Edgar's throat, and joined the fight. 

 

"Yona, take Timothy and go!" Namgoong yelled, and Curtis was aware in his peripheral vision that she had obeyed, heading for the house. Curtis dropped his knife somehow, and Mason got in a heavy blow to his right arm with the metal shovel, causing it to go completely numb for a moment before it woke again in extreme pain, hanging at an angle.

 

He did not give up. Bloody, bruised, and wounded, after a fierce fight that lasted only minutes, Namgoong and Curtis had Mason pinned to the ground, knife at her throat.

 

"You killed Edgar. You killed Grey." Curtis said.

 

"Oh come on, you didn't even know Grey!"

 

"You're not fit to be a vice principal."

 

"Like you're any better? I wasn't the only one who ate human flesh. What was it you said? Freshmen taste best?"

 

Curtis roared in rage and stabbed Mason once, twice, and then when the knife got stuck he punched her, raining blows down on her face, her shoulders, her arms, her - 

 

"Curtis! Stop, she's gone," Namgoong said, pulling him away. Yona and Timothy had come back out into the garden, and Yona covered Timothy's face so he didn't have to see anything, but he pushed her hand away and stared. Curtis felt sick, like he was going to contaminate everything around him. 

 

"I have to get out of here," Curtis said.

 

"Yes, you need a doctor." Namgoong replied, but that wasn't what Curtis meant.

 

"No, I mean I need to go. I can't be at this school anymore. I need to get away from here."

 

"I'll go with you." Namgoong said instantly, and put his hand on Curtis's good arm. His touch reassured Curtis a little bit. 

 

"Me too," Yona added, and her father walked up to her, putting his arms on her shoulders.

 

"No, Yona. You need to stay here. Get an education. Make sure the next vice principal is not like Mason. I'll come back for you, alright? I love you," Namgoong said.

 

"I love you too," she replied, and hugged her father, eyes brimming with tears.

 

"Go back to Tanya before she wonders if I kidnapped her son," Curtis said.

 

"Grey's gone," Timothy replied. Curtis managed the tiniest of smiles, bitter and sad. Yona wiped Edgar's blood off her cheek and licked her fingers experimentally.

 

"Good for him," Curtis said, and pushed Mason's body into the open grave as Yona and Timothy walked back together to the dorms. 

**Author's Note:**

> I kind of want to write a spinoff of Yona and Grey's adventures at Wilford Academy now. Anyway, the title is thanks to my lovely and hilarious friend Marg!


End file.
